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System Shock 2 is one of the best RPG-shooter hybrids of all time, in our opinion, but unfortunately, getting it to run on modern computers can sometimes be difficult, given the tangled web of mods and patches that are needed to make it work properly. Though we don't cover it officially, the excellent Thief 2: The Metal Age also shares the same game engine and some gameplay similarities, and elicits similar nostalgia. With developers Looking Glass Studios and Irrational Games long gone, the chances of any sort of enhanced version being released officially seem slim.

It's a bit of a surprise, then, to learn that some anonymous and diligent coder has apparently been hard at work creating an unofficial 2.4 patch for System Shock 2 (and 1.19 for Thief 2) over a decade after their release dates. The circumstances of this update are mysterious - apparently, the files were posted on a French message board without much fanfare - rumor says that this update may be related to the source code release of the cancelled Dreamcast versions of the games, however.

Please note that as this patch is not official, we cannot endorse its stability or compatibility - so you may want to treat it as a mod more than a "real" update. However, as the fixes many new (largely technical) features and fixes, that probably won't stop most fans of these games.

The extensive change log is as follows:

This is an unofficial patch for System Shock 2 (SS2) which updates the game from v2.3 to v2.4, providing improved support for modern hardware and correcting many known bugs. SS2 can usually be found on Amazon (or similar).

Renderer:

Added windowed mode

Added single display mode option - no resolution change between menus and game

Added ingame support for all common resolutions, including widescreen

Added support for 32-bit color

Textures can now be automatically promoted to 32-bit, improving quality and effectively eliminating the palette limit

Added UI framerate cap option to avoid GPU fan spinning up in UI

Added DDS/PNG image support

Added full 24/32-bit TGA/BMP image support

Increased the maximum number of frames allowed in animated textures from 20 to 99, and increased the allowable filename length for animated textures (before the underscore) to support more than 7

Animated texture rate can now be specified via a material file for that texture

Made navigation of map/objectives screen a little bit more in-game friendly (screen can also be closed with space, arrow key navigation and return to switch map/obj)

There are an extensive number of additional fixes that apply to the game's editor as well, as well as some undocumented additions in the cam_ext.cfg file (like the inclusion of bloom lighting and menu scaling options). All in all, it's a happy day for gamers.